Beketov still recovering from attack a year later in Russia

Those familiar with Mikhail Beketov’s ordeal describe his survival as nothing short of a miracle. The once fit, towering 51-year-old who campaigned on environmental issues and criticized his city government’s policies through the pages of his newspaper is now gone. But the former editor of Khimkinskaya Pravda, an independent publication that exposed the blunders of the Khimki administration headed by Mayor Vladimir Strelchenko, has a fierce desire to return to normal life, or at least some semblance of it. He has a long way to go and he needs our help.

More than a year ago, on November 13, 2008, neighbors
found Beketov lying unconscious in a pool of blood, in the front garden of
his home in Khimki, a Moscow suburb. Attackers had struck to kill—they broke
his skull, smashed the fingers of both hands, broke his legs, and left him for
dead in the freezing cold. Doctors estimated that the attack had occurred at
least a day and a half before Beketov was discovered. He spent three weeks in a
coma, had seven surgeries including leg and finger amputations, and underwent
treatment in three different hospitals. Last week, doctors with the surgical
unit at the RussianAcademy of Sciences
performed an operation to restore the journalist’s trachea; a tube had been
inserted in his throat in the months after the near-lethal attack to help his
breathing. Now Beketov must re-learn how to speak. More restorative surgeries
are to come.

Beketov’s rehabilitation will take months, if not years,
doctors say.

Meanwhile, his attackers are still at large; moreover, it is
unclear whether a serious investigation is under way. Two months after Beketov
was beaten, the lawyer representing his interests, Stanislav Markelov, was
murdered in downtown Moscow
along with a reporter from the independent Moscow-based newspaper Novaya Gazeta. Beketov had received
death threats a week before the attack and reported them to law enforcement,
and there have been no arrests. Novaya
Gazeta, which has covered the attack and its aftermath extensively,
undertook its own investigation into the incident. The paper reported that
Khimki police ignored key evidence from the crime scene—officers did not
examine recordings by security cameras across from Beketov’s home that could
have captured the attack, for instance. Beketov’s neighbors were never questioned
in detail, Novaya Gazeta said.

After Khimkinskaya Pravda published an article on
excavations at a World War II burial site in 2007, local prosecutors brought
defamation charges against Beketov. Most outrageously, while Beketov’s
attackers roam free, the journalist is banned from traveling outside of Russia
because the case against him is still pending.

A previous attack on Beketov is also unsolved. In May 2007,
unidentified men set his car on fire. In a separate incident that year, his dog
was deliberately killed.

Friends of Beketov have set up a hard currency account in Russia for
individuals and organizations abroad who wish to help the editor recover. Here are
the details:

Nina Ognianova is coordinator of CPJ’s Europe and Central Asia Program. A native of Bulgaria, Ognianova has carried out numerous fact-finding and advocacy missions across the region. Her commentaries on press freedom have appeared in the Guardian, the International Herald Tribune, the Huffington Post, and the EU Observer, among others. Follow her on Twitter @Kremlinologist1

Comments

This is horrible. I feel very sad...

I really suggest some international organization come down really hard on Russian government. It is too corrupt.

And you know what? I have no idea why international organizations want to help a crazy society like this prosper. Why would international governments want to help Russia when it lets things like this happen and do nothing about it? He was only a journalist... a devoted one. Everyone has opinions and, in Russia, when the people speak their minds and it seems actually correct, the government kills them... Very rational, by Russian standards, I'm sure.

Again, I am very sorry for you, Mr. Beketov... I hope you realize people admire you and that someday there will be justice in Russia. You should know your friends in the United States support you. Don't be afraid to ask for our help.